At the end of the first week, as I paid her, I noticed in the way she looked at the notes-the sudden focused attention, the satisfied care with which she put the money away-an intensity, a wave of interest, that made me see her for a moment in an unexpected light. Recalling her remark about how much Kloster paid her, I realised with surprise and slight alarm that money really did matter to the lovely Luciana.
What happened next? Well, a few things. There was a series of very hot days, an unexpected return of summer in mid-March, and Luciana swapped her blouses for short vests that exposed her shoulders as well as expanses of stomach and back. When she leaned forward to read from the screen I could see the gentle arch of her spine, and below the hollow of her back a spiral of blond downy hair extended to-and I could see it perfectly-the tiny and always troubling triangle of her panties peeping from her jeans. Was it deliberate? Of course not. It was all entirely innocent and we still looked at each other with the same innocent eyes, carefully avoiding touching in my narrow kitchen. It was in any case a new and very pleasant sight.
On one of these identically hot days, as I leaned over to check a sentence on the screen, I rested my hand, again innocently, on the back of the chair. She had shifted forward but now sat back, her shoulder against my hand, gently trapping it. Neither of us moved to break contact-that furtive but lengthy first contact-and, until we took our first break, I continued dictating standing, caught there touching her, feeling through my fingers, like an intense intermittent signal, a secret warm current, the heat of her skin from her neck to her shoulders.
A couple of days later I started dictating the first truly erotic scene of the novel. When I’d finished I asked her to read it back to me. I replaced a few words with cruder alternatives, and asked her to read it again. She complied, as unselfconscious as ever, and I could detect no agitation in her voice as she read the steamy passages. Even so, there was now a slight sexual tension in the air. I hoped, I said for the sake of saying something, that Kloster didn’t subject her to such writing. She looked at me calmly and a little sardonically: she was used to it, she said, Kloster dictated things that were much worse. By a curious inflection of her voice, ‘worse’ seemed to mean better. A half-smile lingered on her lips, as if she were remembering something in particular, and I took it as a challenge. I went on dictating, waiting patiently for her to bend her neck from side to side. When at last I heard the bones crack I slid my hand under her hair and pressed the joint with my fingers. I think this irrevocable move-from avoiding touching her at all costs to touching her decisively-startled her as much as it did me, even as I tried to make it seem casual. She didn’t move, didn’t breathe, her hands away from the keyboard. She was staring straight ahead, and I couldn’t decide whether she was hoping for something more or something less.
“When I get rid of this cast I’ll give you a massage,” I said and moved my hand to the back of the chair.
“When you get rid of the cast you won’t need me any more,” she answered, still not turning, smiling nervously, equivocally, as if she could see an opportunity to escape but hadn’t yet decided if she wanted to take it.
“I could always break something else,” I said, and looked into her eyes. She looked away immediately.
“That would be no good: you know Kloster’s getting back next week,” she said neutrally, as if she wanted, gently, to make me stop. Or was she simply testing me?
“Kloster, Kloster,” I said plaintively. “Why should Kloster have everything?”
“I don’t think he has everything he wants,” she said.
That was all she said, in the same even tone as before, but there was a quiet hint of pride in her voice. I thought I understood what she wanted me to understand. But if she was trying to cheer me up, she’d only added another source of irritation. So Kloster, who was so serious, had after all also had designs on our little Luciana. From what I’d just heard, he might even have already made a first move. And Luciana, far from slamming the door in his face, was about to go back to him. Kloster, now more enviable than ever even if he hadn’t yet got very far with her, would have an opportunity every day. And as well as being proud that she was rejecting him, Luciana would also no doubt feel proud that he kept trying. Wasn’t she at an age, just out of adolescence, when women want to test their powers of attraction on every man?
I imagined all of this from that slight inflexion of her voice, but couldn’t make Luciana reveal anything more. As I started to probe, she said, blushing slightly, that she’d simply meant what she’d said: no one, not even Kloster, could have everything. That she wanted to deny it now simply served as confirmation and though I couldn’t follow all its implications, I felt suddenly discouraged. There was an uncomfortable silence. Then she asked, almost imploringly, if we shouldn’t continue working. Somewhat humiliated, I searched for the point in my manuscript where I’d stopped. I was mortified: I realised that in harping on Kloster so insistently I might have lost my chance. Had I ever had one? I’d thought I had with that first touch, despite her sudden stiffness. But now, as I continued dictating, it had all vanished, as if we’d both resumed our previous places, with a civilised distance between us. Nevertheless, as she picked up her bag before leaving, her eyes sought mine, as if she wanted to make sure of something, or, like me, she wanted to recover some of the contact that had been lost. This glance only disconcerted me all over again: it might mean simply that she didn’t bear me a grudge but would rather forget what had just happened, or that the door, in spite of everything, was still open.
I waited impatiently for the day to end. The month had passed too quickly and I realised that there were only a couple of days left before Luciana disappeared from my life. When I let her in the next morning I looked to see if anything in her face or general appearance had changed since the day before-whether she’d tried a little more make-up, or a bit less clothing-but if anything she seemed to have succeeded in looking the same as always. And yet, nothing was the same. We sat down and I began dictating the last chapter of my novel. I wondered whether the imminent end wouldn’t stir something in her as well, but as if we were applying ourselves with the utmost concentration to playing our parts, Luciana’s hands, her head, her entire attention, seemed fully focused on my voice.
As the morning progressed, I realised I was waiting for a single movement. Strange dissociation. Though I still noticed the same things as usual-the gap between her T-shirt and the line of her panties, the seductively furrowed brow, the tips of her teeth biting her lip now and then, the movement of her shoulders as she leaned forward-it was strangely distant and all that I could really see before me, with extraordinary clarity, was the nape of her neck. I was waiting, with the pathetic expectancy of Pavlov’s dog, for the moment when she would bend her neck from side to side. But the signal never came, as if she too had become conscious of the power, the danger, of that cracking sound. I waited incredulously, and then almost feeling as if I’d been cheated, till the very last moment, but her neck, her lovely capricious neck, remained stubbornly still, and I had to let that day go.
The next morning was our last. When Luciana arrived and dropped her tiny bag down beside her, it seemed simply inconceivable that I might no longer have her with me and that all these little routines would disappear. The first two hours passed, exasperatingly. During a break Luciana went to the kitchen to make coffee. This too was happening for the last time. I followed her and remarked, half humorous, half dejected, that next week she would be back to taking dictation of good novels. I told her of Campari’s injunction when giving me her number, that I had to return her intact, and I added that to my regret I was complying. All this managed to draw from her was an uncomfortable smile. We went back to work. I only had a few pages of the epilogue left to dictate. I thought bitterly that we might even finish a little early that day. On one of the final pages there was a German street name and Luciana wanted me to check she’d spelled it correctly. I leaned over her shoulder to look at the screen, as I had done so many times in the past month, and once again I was enveloped in the scent of her hair. Then, just as I was about to move my hand from the back of the chair, like a belated call that I’d ceased to expect, she tilted her head to one side, almost touching me, then the other. I heard the crack and, as if it were a continuation of that first time, slid my hand beneath her hair until I found the gap between the vertebrae. She gave a small faltering sigh and leaned her head back, yielding to my touch. She turned her face towards me, expectantly. I kissed her once. She closed her eyes, and half opened them again. I kissed her more deeply and slid my left hand under her T-shirt. But the cast on my other hand hampered me and she was able to push the chair back slightly and free herself easily.